CDT NEWS AND INFORMATION

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Happy Lunar New Year! Concerning Superfest, this international disability film festival is now the collaborative project of The Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability at San Francisco State University (http://longmoreinstitute.sfsu.edu) and The LightHouse for the Blind of San Francisco (http://lighthouse-sf.org).

After producing this film festival for nearly 15 years in Berkeley, Culture Disability Talent was delighted to pass the torch in 2012 to exceptional new leadership, who recently introduced "The Dissies" awards to the Bay Area disability community.

Check out their new Superfest website (http://superfestfilm.com) for details and please support Superfest efforts to keep raising the bar for disability portrayals.

Regards,
Liane C. Yasumoto
CDT Executive Director

A Community Celebration of the Creative Works of Cheryl Marie Wade

Please join us for an afternoon of celebrating the writing and
performance work of the late Cheryl Marie Wade.

CDT announces passing the Superfest Torch to the Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability Culture and the San Francisco Lighthouse for the Blind

The previous organizers of the Superfest International Disability Film Festival are thrilled to introduce the stellar new management team: Catherine Kudlick of the Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability and Bryan Bashin of the San Francisco Lighthouse for the Blind.

The new team Much of 2012 was spent developing plans for how to carry forward with Superfest International Disability Film Festival, now that the members of the core group are retiring, relocating or pursuing other passions. We invited a number of Bay Area disability culture specialists to tell us what they thought were the essential elements of Superfest and who had the vision, talent and energy to take it to the next level. We were soon led to Catherine Kudlick, Professor of History, SFSU, who became Director of the Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability
(http://longmoreinstitute.sfsu.edu) in August 2012. Kudlick is charged with finding new ways to explore disability arts with both academic and community involvement. As many will recall, the late Prof. Longmore was a disability arts and culture leader who mentored young filmmakers and participated in Superfest to support their efforts. Kudlick introduced us to another new star in the Bay Area firmament, Bryan Bashin, the CEO of the San Francisco Lighthouse for the Blind
(http://lighthouse-sf.org), who oversaw development of its new accessible video conference center, completed in 2012. The new leaders like the idea of challenging society's assumption that blind people can't participate in film creation, production, appreciation, and critique.

Together, they have committed to continuing a Bay Area based festival that will annually showcase juried films of artistic excellence that portray disability or reflect on issues from a disability point of view. They are looking to expand the traditional film festival experience to include more fringe or experimental aspects, such as animation, television treatment of disability issues, collaborative events with film schools, a research room where students and film aficionados could tap into a disability film collection, and a "film camp" where film lovers could spend long weekends at an accessible retreat evaluating new or classic productions. As you can see, the new team is using a wide-angle lens to examine ways to make the festival experience more dynamic and involving a greater number of participants.

Brief history The left-coast based international disability film festival, known as Superfest, is the longest running festival of its kind in the world. After its developmental years in Los Angeles in the 1980s, it was transferred to the Bay Area in 1998. Operated as a project of CDT (formerly Corporation on Disabilities & Telecommunication, now Culture, Disability, Talent), annual film festivals were held in Berkeley 1998-2011, under direction of Pamela Walker, succeeded by Liane Yasumoto in 2002.

The CDT Board has approved the transfer of responsibilities for Superfest to the new “Longmore/Lighthouse team” and its remaining assets to supporting the CDT Executive Director in the transition period. CDT will work with the team in 2013 to ensure that Superfest will have continuous offerings in 2013 and beyond.

What's next
In 2013 the new team will be exploring collaboration and funding to initiate the next international disability film festival, slated for 2014. They will be in touch soon with information on an entertaining, educational fall 2013 interim event that will keep Superfest fans on the edge of their seats. Visit http://www.cripflix.org or email cripflix@gmail.com for more information.

We are very pleased to have found a new home for Superfest, and hope that you continue to support the new team of leaders who have enthusiastically agreed to adopt the film festival and take it to new heights. Thank you very much!